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[Liang Jieming]

Chinese Siege Warfare: Mechanical Artillery & Siege Weapons of Antiquity - An Illustrated History
Limited Print First Edition
ISBN 981-05-5380-3 (pbk.)

USD$29.99 + S/H (+ optional USD$2.00 (Registered)) (International orders)
SGD$49.99 (Singapore orders)

Exclusive 30% CHF discount for CHF members. (Total of 50 copies reserved for CHF.)
(Applicable only for Limited Print First Edition. While stocks last!)
CHF member current reservation count [46 of 50] <-- to be updated regularly, stocks running out fast!
I will autograph your copy upon request.

A4 sized landscape. Total number of pages approximately 160+ (with coloured photographs and illustrations), softcover. Approximately 500gms net weight.

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PM me for more details and for book pre-orders.

Sample pages;






You want to help distribute books where you live?
Do you know any bookstore keeper or Castle-giftshop owner or belong to a wargaming/historical society/club and need more than just a couple of books? I can offer slightly better rates for bulk orders and you can then sell them at the full price and earn the difference. Distributor discounts are from 30% to 40% (for bulk orders of 200 copies and above).

Note: Non-exclusive US distribution rights have been assigned to RLT Publishing, San Antonio, Texas.

Edited by Liang Jieming, 18 September 2006 - 10:07 PM.

[Liang Jieming]

Synopsis
For millennia, Chinese armies dominated their rivals by having superior weaponry on their side. So successful was this dominance in arms that the early rapid growth and expansion of the Chinese sphere of influence and control, was halted only by physical geographical barriers such as the mountain ranges of the Tibetan Plateau, the deserts and grass steppes of the northwest and the Pacific Ocean to the east. Since the early years of Chinese civilisation, warfare has been an integral part and parcel of life. Much of this was fought in the mountain passes, the fortified towns of the open plains, the river gorges, the open steppes, the vast deserts, the long convoluted coastline, and in the varied and rugged geography of the Chinese heartland. The rise and development of Chinese siege technology was but one facet of Chinese warfare, but one no less important in the continuous struggle for the Chinese to survive as a people and as a political entity. The drive to innovate and to gain the upper hand over rivals, both within the country as well as outside the country, pushed military Engineers to dazzling heights of inventive excellence. Reaching a peak in the late Song dynasty, decline began when the devastation of the Mongol invasion and the Ming and Qing dynasties' inability to compete in the new gunpowder arms race with the new threat from the West proved the undoing for a proud Chinese tradition in siege warfare, much of which remains sadly unknown and unacknowledged to this day.

This book traces the development of Chinese siege technology from ca. 8th century B.C. to the end of the Qing dynasty and makes comparisons with siege weapons of several other world civilisations. Bringing together the development history of catapults from the Islamic world, the ancient Greco-Roman catapults, the mysterious catapults of India, the simple catapults of pre-Columbus America, the catapults of medieval Europe, and East Asian catapults, a fairly comprehensive picture emerges within this book, on the progression of catapult technology, showing how each civilisation contributed and interacted in a fascinating global exchange of ideas.


Reviews

"Drawing on many primary and secondary sources and lavishly illustrated, this book provides an excellent introduction to the art of siege warfare in early China. Especially valuable are Liang's clear and accurate explanations of the often highly technical specifications of the individual machines, their method of deployment, and advantages and disadvantages; the comparisons he makes with western siege machinery; and his scale reconstructions of individual engines. I strongly recommend this work."
- Robin D.S. Yates, James McGill Professor of History and East Asian Studies, co-author, Science and Civilisation in China vol. 5 part 6 "Military Technology"

"For those interested in technical warfare, Chinese Siege Warfare: Mechanical Artillery & Siege Weapons of Antiquity offers an amazing synopsis of the various devices developed by China for the past 3000 years, from repeating crossbows (4th century B.C.) to the giant catapults of the Tang (7th - 10th century A.D.) and Song (10th - 13th century A.D.) dynasties and cannons of the Ming (14th - 17th century A.D.) dynasty.

The Western amateur will recognise in this comprehensive survey catapults, trebuchets, ballistae and mangonels almost identical to those used for the conquest of Gaul by Julius Caesar (58 – 51 B.C.) or by their medieval ancestors in their never ending quarrels. Less obvious discoveries for those who still believe that gunpowder was first introduced to the world's battlefields at the battle of Crécy (A.D. 1346) are the Chinese flame throwers (A.D. 919), fire lances, the ancestor of the gun (11th century A.D.), landmines (A.D. 1277) or the amazing Huo Che (A.D. 1401), the first multiple rocket launcher deployed in the field 540 years before Stalin’s organs.

From Liang Jieming’s comparative history of siege weapons, you will learn that gun powder or Huo Yao (“fire medicine”) was first experimented in China in 142 A.D. and its ingredients fully described in the 4th century A.D. From then on, the unsavoury recipe could start its long journey westward, reaching Arabic weaponsmiths in A.D. 1240 before eventually falling in the hands of Plantagenet’s King Edward the 3rd.

One may wonder why the Chinese, who developed such fantastic ordnance several hundred years before everybody else, could lose their dominance and be defeated in the 19th century A.D. by foreign invaders. The answer lies in Chinese history and Darwin’s theory of evolution. From the end of the Warring States (221 B.C.), with the unification of China under the Qin (221 - 207 B.C) dynasty, Chinese armies mainly had to fend off relatively ill-equipped nomadic tribes outside the Great Wall while European barons were permanently battling each other. For the latter, an ever improving arsenal was a question of survival. China did not upgrade her weaponry as quickly simply because, until the First Opium War (A.D. 1839 – 1842), she did not have to.

I am ready to bet that the lesson has not been lost; and that our contemporary Chinese friends have made theirs the latin proverb: Si vis pacem, para bellum."
- Ingénieur général de l'armement Jean Laporte (Major-General Jean Laporte - French Armament Corps)

"Liang Jieming’s history of Chinese siege warfare and its associated weapons brings a neglected aspect of military history to the attention of the English-reading public. It should be of great interest to military historians, general historians, wargamers and modellers, and indeed anyone with an interest in the often turbulent history of pre-modern China.

From its earliest beginnings in the Warring States period, via the Tang armies whose campaigns into Korea and Central Asia exported siege technologies to the wider world, the introduction of gunpowder into warfare by the Song and their enemies in the great wars of the 12th and 13th centuries, to the cannon and rockets of the Ming, this is a story of unceasing experiment and innovation. This study should dispel any lingering Western ideas that Chinese warfare was static and opposed to new technologies.

Liang’s work combines studies of particular weapons with sections that set them into their chronological framework. The work is profusely illustrated with an excellent selection of contemporary drawings and paintings, photographs of surviving weapons, and the author’s own lively drawings which set the devices he discusses into context, showing their use in sieges or in warfare in the field. His reconstruction models of Chinese and Western siege artillery are fascinating projects which bear witness to the author’s painstaking attention to detail as well as his engineering skills.

I recommend this work most highly to anyone with the smallest interest in East Asian warfare or technology."
- Duncan Head, author of "Armies of the Macedonian and Punic Wars, 359 BC to 146 BC" (Wargames Research Group, 1982) and "The Achaemenid Persian Army" (Montvert Publications, 1992)


About the Author

Er. Leong Kit Meng earned his degree at the University of British Columbia, Canada, in Structural Engineering and is currently a registered Professional Engineer with the Professional Engineers Board of Singapore. Throughout his career as a Structural Engineer, he has designed and analysed many different types of structures throughout South East Asia, including that of many well-known local sports stadiums, industrial plants, and especially the structural elements for the Lyric Theatre of the "Esplanade - Theatres at the Bay", Singapore.

Er. Leong maintains a deep-rooted interest in history with an emphasis on the technological, scientific and engineering advances of various ancient cultures, especially those found in the histories of the Mesopotamians, the Chinese, the Greco-Romans, and the Central Americans. A vocal advocate of the need to promote and greater understand Chinese history and culture, he writes under his Mandarin pinyin name, "Liang Jieming" on a diverse range of topics.

"Chinese Siege Warfare: Mechanical Artillery & Siege Weapons of Antiquity" is his first published book. The scaled models illustrated in this book were a result of careful research and was born out of a need to understand the fundamentals behind the construction and usage of these ancient but fascinating siege machines, and is rooted in his firm belief that "History should be fun... and hands-on".

Edited by Liang Jieming, 30 July 2006 - 02:53 AM.

[WangEnlai]

- Ingénieur général de l'armement Jean Laporte (Major-General Jean Laporte - French Armament Corps)

Never knew about this.

Hey Liang, mind posting the exact deadline when you turn in the book? (not when I have to get the pics into you)

[fcharton]

Well, any book General Laporte promotes is a must buy for me...

And I will be delighted to see LJM's replica of the infamous wonton gun... (Jieming dear, there is yet another typo...)

François, pink siege bunny (sound awkward, doesn't it?)

[Liang Jieming]

I'll save you a very nicely autographed copy.

[Mei Houwang]

Wow, good job Liang. I never thought I'd see the day, yet here it is, with good review points at that.

[Liang Jieming]

It's actually thanks to you guys it's finally complete. Loads of people here have helped with their often sensible comments (and even the wierd ones helped too in their own wierd way) as the models were being built and as I was putting the information together and writing the book so a big THANK YOU to CHF members! So in return, I'm offering the distributor discount rate to CHF members who PM me for copies mailed from Singapore.

[Centaur]

Yes, and we will be getting it. Could pick up the copy from you on 19th August, if you are going to the ACM talk. Great job.

[Moose]

Ever thought of bundling it with a mini catapult construction kit? Reserver 1 copy for me, ok?

[Liang Jieming]

Done! You're got one with your name on it.

Catapult kit? kekeke... I'm workin' on it.

[Liang Jieming]

Did you write down a list with addresses and all yet? Shipping must be hell.

Yes. I'm still losing money at this point especially since I've quite a number of free copies I need to send out to people who'd given me reviews and stuff, not to mention the discount I'm giving CHF members is the equivalent of the kinds of bulk pricing given to distributors.

[Centaur]

Yes. I'm still losing money at this point especially since I've quite a number of free copies I need to send out to people who'd given me reviews and stuff, not to mention the discount I'm giving CHF members is the equivalent of the kinds of bulk pricing given to distributors.

Hey there, keep the discount and use it for postage of the books for the overseas CHF members. Good enough that we get an authographed copy from you.

[Liang Jieming]

I'll pay for my copy Worth it, btw working right now.

no, no, you've got a nice autographed copy compliments from me for all your hardwork, with or without your coloured illustrations. Only thing I might need you to do for me is to deliver a copy to the Cardinal in SF if it's not too much trouble.

Hey there, keep the discount and use it for postage of the books for the overseas CHF members. Good enough that we get an authographed copy from you.

Hmm.... S/H is extra on top of the book so the discount is already going towards helping CHF members defray the cost of shipping which can be expensive if you're not in Asia (minus Japan)

[Liang Jieming]

Ahh... that is no problem, my respect for the Cardinal is great. -strokes beard, and gives a very sexy smile-

PM Cardinal's address?

As for your pics, still going strong for color! No worries on that, forgoing sleep. Sleep? I can do that after I finish everything.

Hey, hey, like I said before. SATs first.

I haven't heard from the Cardinal yet but he's reserved a copy. I'll get back to you on that. You can make it a SF-CHF meeting. I think there is at least one more person from SF other than the two of you.

[shurite7]

Liang,

where do I go to order your book? Your website?

Cheers

Chris